Termini Bros. Bakery in Philadelphia gives out iconic, nostalgic tile flooring pieces

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- You can own a piece of Philadelphia history beginning on Friday.

Termini Bros. Bakery will be serving up tradition, along with its famous pastries.

Starting at 9 a.m., the bakery will be handing out small gift boxes to customers.

Inside will be square porcelain memories, pieces of the iconic tile flooring, that the owners recently ripped up and replaced.

READ | Customers want a piece of nostalgic tile flooring from Termini Bros. in Philadelphia

When Termini Bros. announced on Instagram that it would be replacing the iconic black and white tile floor at their flagship bakery on South 8th street, they were flooded with customers begging for a piece of their historic flooring.

"These are the memories from over 100 years of going to grandma's house and picking up cannoli on Sunday morning," says Joseph Termini, co-owner of Termini Bros.

"I can understand how special this is to people. This tile is Christmas Eve, it's celebrations," he added.

Joseph and his brother, co-owner Vincent Termini, say they're still kind of floored that people wanted a piece of their old flooring.

When the tiles were in disrepair earlier this summer, the bakery announced on Instagram that their flagship South 8th Street location would close while they replaced it.

"We had a very strong reaction, people who were emotionally connected to Termini Bros.," says Vincent. "They were like, 'No! What are you doing?' Like we were disturbing a piece of their livelihood."

Customers begged for a piece, so they stopped the demolition, cleaned the old tiles, and boxed them up.

"When we put it together, we wanted to make sure that if it sat in somebody's living room, people would remember what it is and what it's about," Vincent says. "We put the storefront on the box, which was built in 1938."

Inside the box is a note from a longtime customer who writes, "To me, this little piece of tile is priceless."

Randy Rossi from Swedesboro, New Jersey says he understands the sentimentality of this.

"If you think about how many years I walked on this," Rossi explains. "My father is not with us anymore, and I know he used to come here. It could be a piece of the tile that he walked on."

When Termini Bros. opens Friday at 9 a.m., people coming in to buy pastries can leave with one boxed tile.

They have 2,800 to hand out and say they are saving some for Christmas Eve.